~ By Tom Boggie

Remember the old days at Albany-Saratoga Speedway, when Brett Hearn and Ken Tremont Jr. and Jack Johnson would start deep in the pack every week and come charging to the front, when there was a big ass cushion to tuck up against and run the extreme outside?

Yeah, well, those days are gone. Now, with everyone running those twitchy coil cars and needing a smooth, slick racing surface, the secret to winning, or finishing well, is starting position.

Both Mike Mahaney and Scott Huber proved that last Friday night, with Mahaney chalking up his third modified victory of the season for car owner George Huttig, and Huber finishing second for the second time this season.

Mahaney started eighth and Huber started on the outside pole, and both were pleased with their results. But they also knew that starting position was a big factor.

“I definitely think it helped starting eighth,” said Mahaney. “We’ve been struggling the last three weeks or so. I made some wrong calls for the last couple of weeks and I was getting pretty disappointed. We work really hard at this and I thought we should have gotten it back quicker than we did.”

Then he explained the secret to winning.

“It’s all about getting to the front before the first caution,” he said. “We were in the front row when the first caution came out tonight (on lap 27), and that’s where we needed to be.

“If you start deep in the pack, the first five laps under green, you can get pretty bottled up and it’s easy to lose two or three spots and then the leaders get away. Without any cautions, you can’t catch them.”

Huber has never won a modified feature at Albany-Saratoga Speedway, but with the way the Dave Hunt LSX7 is humming, he’s now a serious threat.

“I feel like my whole career has been like this, always getting close,” he said after his second-place finish last week. “We’re so close, but we just can’t get one. I just have to learn how to win.”

Huber led the first 15 laps last Friday before dropping as far as third. But he achieved a little more satisfaction when he passed Peter Britten to regain the No. 2 spot with six laps left.

“It was tough on the bottom,” he said. “I was leaving a little on the table getting into three. But I moved up the last six laps and it was better up there. Mahaney was just better than we were overall.”

Huber knows that getting his first win is going to take a perfect storm.

“You’ve got to start in the top 10, and you’ve got to have a good car,” he said. “But even then, you have to have the breaks go your way.”

MORE FROM MALTA

While Mahaney and Huber were enjoying their night, Demetrios Drellos was on his way back to Queensbury. Drellos finished fifth in his heat race, but then discovered an engine problem that couldn’t be fixed at the track. So he loaded up and went home.

Matt DeLorenzo finished eighth in the modified feature to retain his point lead, but he almost had a short night. In the second modified heat, front-row starters Ryan McCartney and CG Morey got together coming out of the fourth turn, which sent McCartney heading across the track. DeLorenzo just missed slamming into McCartney’s car.

After struggling in the modified division for most of the season, Derrick McGrew Jr. made the decision to return to the sportsman ranks Friday night. He qualified through the consolation and then finished 15th at Malta, and also went to Glen Ridge Motorsports Park on Sunday and earned a podium finish, behind winner Andrew Buff and Ricky Quick.

Chris Jakubiak chalked up his first career sportsman win last Friday, and became the 13th different winner in that class this season. Only Pat Jones (three) and Tim Hartman Jr. (two) have multiple wins.

One of the sportsman drivers still looking for his first win is Dylan Madsen. Madsen’s run of bad luck continued last week, as he suffered a broken right front shock during his heat race. He made repairs and qualified through the consy, but could only manage a 22nd-place finish in the feature.

The sportsman will be running double features on Friday, making up the feature that was rained out on July 1. Speaking of rainouts, if promoter Lyle DeVore hadn’t canceled racing on May 27 because of an unfavorable weather forecast, last Friday’s card would have been the 18th consecutive night of racing in 2022, which would have tied the record set in 2012.

REMEMBERING J.D.

With the NASCAR Cup Series returning to Watkins Glen this weekend, it marks the 31st anniversary of the death of journeyman racer J.D. McDuffie. McDuffie died on Aug. 11, 1991 after suffering severe head trauma when he slammed into the tire and wire fence when he lost control of his car after a wheel broke at one of the fastest parts of the old layout. I was there that day, and it was bizarre. NASCAR officials announced that McDuffie had been killed in the wreck, and it was eerie watching McDuffie’s car being brought back to the garage, on a rollback under a blue tarp. McDuffie, who finished third in the Albany-Saratoga 250 in 1971, behind Richard Petty and Dave Marcis, was once asked why he kept five cigars in the pocket of his firesuit. “I chew one every 100 miles,” he said. “If I make it to the fifth cigar, I’ve had a pretty good day.”

AROUND THE TRACKS

It’s hard to keep up with Stewart Friesen these days. Last Friday, he raced on dirt at Delaware International Speedway and finished second. On Saturday, he was running in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series in Richmond, Va., where he finished 11th. On Monday, he was at Ohsweken Speedway in Canada, finishing second in the Canadian Sprint Car Championships. He switched to the Pinty’s Series at Ohsweken on Tuesday and had the lead going into the third turn on the final lap before Treyten Lapcevich pulled off a bump-and-run and passed Friesen for the win, which was worth $25,000. Friesen was also back in the sprint car Tuesday, finishing sixth after winning the B-main and starting 17th. He was scheduled to race in the DIRTcar SummerFast Series Wednesday at Fulton, but that was rained out.

Back to SummerFast. The week started with the rain-delayed 100-lapper at Weedsport, with Jimmy Phelps winning the top prize of $10,000. Mahaney had a strong second-place finish. The racing at Weedsport also included sportsman, and Malta regular Daryl Nutting made the trip and finished eighth. SummerFast went to Brewerton on Tuesday, with Matt Sheppard winning from the pole, Britten finished third in the 60-lapper, while Mahaney was seventh. That was Britten’s first top-five finish in a Super DIRT Series race since Volusia County in February.

Congratulations to John Santolin and Randy Edson. Santolin, who has been a regular at Albany-Saratoga all season, made his first trip to the Valley last Saturday and came away with the first limited sportsman win of his career. But it wasn’t his first victory at the Valley. He was previously in victory lane 14 years ago, in what was known as the limited pro stock class.

But Edson waited even longer to get back to victory lane. Edson won Saturday night’s limited sportsman feature at Devil’s Bowl, his first win at the Vermont track in over 28 years. The last time he won a race at the Bowl was on June 5, 1994, when he was running a late model. In those days, Edson was competing against drivers like Tim Laduc, Ernie Grenier, Tim Hartman Sr. and John Turco. Edson also won the late model championship in 1994.

Andy Bachetti has been cruising along at the Valley this season, but his luck ran out last Saturday. He hit the fourth turn wall in the modified feature, damaging the front end of his car and finishing 18th. His point lead over Brett Haas has been cut to 43 points.

Also at the Valley, Montgomery Tremont recorded the first heat race win of his career and came back to finish a career-best fourth in the small block modified feature.

The card at Glen Ridge on Sunday will include a DIRTcar Sportsman East Region tour event, which will pay $1,500 to win. It’s also National Pancreatic Cancer Foundation Night, in honor of Jack Millard.

In case you missed it, DeLorenzo finished third at Fonda last Saturday to secure the modified track championship. As usual, he gave most of the credit to his brother Mike, who is his crew chief. That gives DeLorenzo four championships at Fonda, two in 358s (2004, 2006) and two in modifieds (2007, 2022).